HEART attack victims will receive latest treatment techniques within two years.

The Cheshire and Merseyside region is lagging behind when it comes to offering an operation known as primary angioplasty. Only 2% of patients were treated this way in 2008/09.

The operation involves inflating a balloon in the blocked artery to reopen blood flow.

Patients suitable for treatment are at least twice as likely to survive and suffer less damage to their heart.

Helen Bellairs, chief executive of Western Cheshire Primary Care Trust, who also chairs Cheshire and Merseyside Cardiac Network, said the service only began in January and was being implemented in Liverpool so far.

The technique sees victims travelling by ambulance to Liverpool’s Cardiothoracic Centre, which has the necessary expertise.

But Mrs Bellairs is investigating whether it would be quicker for patients in communities like Malpas to be taken to hospital in Newcastle-Under-Lyme.